The Film Experience™ was created by Nathaniel R. All material herein is written by our team. (This site is not for profit but for an expression of love for cinema & adjacent artforms.)
Tim here. Today, the Academy announced that it has whittled the initial list of 60 titles eligible for the Best Animated Short Film Oscar down to ten finalists that will go on to compete for the five nominations in January. Like all of you, I imagine, I haven't seen most of these ten, but let's run through them quickly to see what we've got:
Bear Story (Historia de un oso) - Gabriel Osorio, director; Pato Escala, producer (Punkrobot Animation Studio) This Chilean effort - Cartoon Brew notes that it would be the first Chilean film ever nominated if it makes it - looks to be a toy-esque animal fable done in charmingly plasticky CGI. Trailer
Carface (Autos Portraits) - Claude Cloutier, director (National Film Board of Canada) A car with, get this, a face, sings "Que Sera, Sera", accompanied by images in thick lines and full color of cars and machines. It never does to count out the NFB, which has one of the most reliable histories of producing terrific animated shorts anywhere in the world. Trailer
Part of the joy of film festivals (I’m told) is discovery, and so, this being Manuel's first full New York Film Festival, he figured he’d give its various Shorts Programs a chance.
It’s not a form I watch often though you’d think it’d be growing in popularity given our ever-shrinking attention spans. And with that in mind, rather than review all thirteen shorts I watched, I’ve singled out highlights from the programs screening at the festival, which include Pixar’s latest and a dazzling black and white queer short from Argentina. More...
You asked some questions. I'm finally answering them. You know how this works. Please do chime in in the comments. The whole reason we do the column is for participatory flavor and that includes a pinch of you! Our Question of the Week which is Friday Night Lights themed is, annoyingly, from "Anonny" (how about a name?) so he/she gets to choose our next banner topic! (And how about our current "joy" banner. I put Jessica Lange in it for the first time and no one notices!?)
What is it, a crime? Is it a crime to look at Lange?
Pat Carroll recording UrsulaJAMES: Does the trend now that animated films only use "names" for voice work mean that we'll never see the likes of Pat Carroll again?
That would be among the greatest of cinematic tragedies. Unlike seemingly many TFE readers, though, I don't actually share an interest in voice actors getting Oscar nominations. But as with motion capture and the much discussed pioneering case of Andy Serkis, I do think this is where Oscar is really dropping the ball in terms of never giving out special achievement statues. I can't even remember when the last one was -- was it for Toy Story (1995) before there was the Animated Feature category? Pat Carroll's work as Ursula is the single greatest voice performance in the history of animation. (Team Experience shamefully put her in only 3rd when we took a poll)
The days of specialized voice talent getting prime opportunities like that are gone but there is hope: Pixar uses celebrities sometimes but they don't rely on them exclusively the way Dreamworks and other lesser studios do. And sometimes their "celebrities" aren't exactly household names so they aren't using them for advertising purposes, but because they genuinely love the voice. Wasn't Richard Kind a great choice for "Bing Bong" in Inside Out?
DEBORAH: If you could choose one lesser-known movie each from the 70s, 80s, and 90s that everyone should see, what would they be (and why)?
Feeling blue today. I know there is much to be happy about but some days it just gets to you even if, with a little perspective, you know that your life is kinda all right. Call it The Pixar Depression (and please do click on that link for an illustration).
I was sad to read this morning that The Dissolve has closed shop effective immediately. They had so many good writers, and were kind enough to link us a couple of times. I hope we hear so many of their regular voices elsewhere soon.
With the Pixar depression caveat in mind, let's just say that running a daily website about the movies is tough work. Though it can be emotionally and intellectually rewarding, it's no easily sustainable road financially... and can also be tough socially and creatively (you don't know what I'd give for a little corporate sponsorship in these parts -- the ability to hire full timers and meet in an office space and brainstorm ideas on a wipe board, and not to have to beg for donations). I sometimes think the movie web is not unlike the current movie business. If you're not on the blockbuster side of things (which for the entertainment web means paparazzi celebrity sites, aggregate list sites, and superhero movie rumor sites) you're only ever going to scrape by if you can scrape by at all.
THINK HAPPY THOUGHTS IN THE COMMENTS TO CHEER US ALL UP
And today hug a fellow cinephile! The internet brought so many of us together but we are still a rare and precious breed.
Manuel here trying to catch up with plenty of news from this past week but somehow not feeling many of them, maybe I'm having a case of the Mondays? I wanted to kick the week off with some more Julia news (is everyone replaying that Secret in Their Eyes trailer for that one perfect gif-able moment?) but somehow typing “Roberts signs on to Garry Marshall’s Mothers Day” was enough of a letdown that I stopped typing. I mean, sure, we could joke that we can’t wait to see Julia in Marshall’s next film, MLK Day, but 30 Rock beat us all to it.
So why don’t we instead focus on the moody teaser for Oliver Stone’s Snowden?
Intense, right? That cast list alone (Gordon-Levitt, Woodley, Leo, Quinto, Wilkinson, Ifans) looks wonderful, but then flashes of W. keep haunting me and well, let’s just say it leaves me wanting. Can’t start Monday on that note, now can we?
Trust Pixar (currently making bank but somehow unable to dethrone those genetically modified dinos) to finally give me something to be excited about this morning. After what’s easily their worst (worst, I say!) short film (seriously, guys, I do not lava Lava!) they might be priming themselves for a gorgeous surprise this Thanksgiving. From a description of the short Sanjay’s Super Team set to premiere before The Good Dinosaur this fall:
“The seven-minute short begins with young Sanjay watching cartoons and eating cereal in a bland, beige room as his father jingles a bell, beckoning him to join in meditation. Reluctant and bored by the ceremony, Sanjay begins daydreaming a kind of ancient, Hindu version of The Avengers, with the gods appearing like superheroes. As the daydream progresses, the color, light and animation of the film grows increasingly dazzling and cosmic, and Sanjay grows closer to understanding his father's inner world.”
"Sanjay's Super Team" is directed by Sanjay Patel, a long time animator at Pixar. [image src]
We’d seen some concept art but now we have two gorgeous images and I have to say, I am eagerly awaiting this short probably even more so than the photorealistic dino adventure that will follow it. I mean, look at those big eyes! Those bright colors! Those kickass character designs!
Are you excited that Pixar seems to be actively trying to redress its diversity problem with characters like Riley, Sadness, Joy, and Sanjay? Are you still trying to forget you ever watched Lava? (If I watch Inside Out in the theaters again, I will definitely be skipping that gender normative sitcom of a short).
Thursday, November 19, 2015 at 11:45PM 
